2 Samuel 8:1-3

Contemporary English Version

A List of David's Victories in War

(1 Chronicles 18.1-13)

8 Later, David attacked and badly defeated the Philistines. Israel was now free from their control.^[a]

²David also defeated the Moabites. Then he made their soldiers lie down on the ground, and he measured them off with a rope. He would measure off two lengths of the rope and have those men killed, then he would measure off one length and let those men live. The people of Moab had to accept David as their ruler and pay taxes to him.

³David set out for the Euphrates River to build a monument^[b] there. On his way,^[c] he defeated the king of Zobah, whose name was Hadadezer the son of Rehob.

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Footnotes

8.1 Israel … control: Or “David also took the town of Metheg-Ammah away from them.”
8.3 monument: Kings sometimes set up monuments in lands they had conquered.
8.3 David … way: One possible meaning for the difficult Hebrew text. It may have been Hadadezer who was going to the Euphrates River. And he may have gone there either to build a monument or to put down a rebellion.